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On September 27, NASA offered members of the media an opportunity to see the GOES-R spacecraft in its processing facility at Astrotech Space Operations in Titusville, FL. The meteorological satellite, the first of the GOES-R series, is being prepared for a November 4 launch on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket at 5:40 pm EDT from Cape Canaveral.

GOES-R at Astrotech. PHoto Credit: Matthew Travis / Zero-G News

The $10.83 billion GOES-R series – consisting of of GOES-R, S, T and U – is the latest and most advanced family of weather satellites in the long-running GOES system. The new spacecraft will provide near real-time observations, providing images of weather pattern and severe storms as frequently as every 30 seconds.

GOES-R, which will be known as GOES-16 once it reaches geostationary orbit, will be placed in the 89.5° checkout orbit where it will undergo an extended checkout and validation phase of approximately one year. The satellite will transition to operations immediately afterward. Once operational, GOES-R will make available 34 meteorological, solar, and space weather products. GOES-R will produce a science data portfolio of ~1.5 TB/day per satellite, using lossless compression.

The GOES-R Program is managed by NOAA with an integrated NOAA-NASA program office organization, staffed with personnel from NOAA and NASA, and supported by industry contractors. The Program is co-located at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.